Edible marijuana sales and public health concerns flourish in Garden City

Alvin Bronstein, medical director of Rocky Mountain Poison Control Center, said a host of additional factors could contribute to edible overdosing, including how fast a person digests it, whether different products react with the body differently and if there is already food in the stomach.

“When you’re dealing with the oral route, it’s just extremely variable,” Bronstein said. “There is a tremendous need for more research so we can better understand this drug.”

He said he also worries that one brownie can still differ too much from dispensary to dispensary due to different recipes, cooking practices and testing methods.

For kids, the dangers of ingesting marijuana are magnified because they are smaller and metabolize differently, said Amy Driscoll, pediatrician at University of Colorado Health Pediatrics in Greeley.

“There’s the major risk of having a psychotic episode when you ingest it and causing yourself or somebody else harm,” she said.

And there are the risks associated with marijuana that come with any psychoactive drug.

“Losing the motivation, achieving less in life, wasting money on drugs, and then becoming addicted to it,” Driscoll listed.

But much remains to be researched as to whether ingesting marijuana can affect kids’ development, which has been linked to regular pot smoking, she said.

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Tweens and greens

Following the passage of Amendment 64, most public health officials say edible marijuana is their greatest concern, especially for kids, who are attracted to all tasty treats and likely don’t understand they won’t feel anything for a while.

Amy Driscoll, a pediatrician at University of Colorado Health Pediatrics in Greeley, 5881 16th St​., offers these tips for talking to your kids about marijuana at different ages:

» 5 and younger

Make sure you and any adults who may be watching your child have safely locked up any marijuana products out of their reach.

» Elementary

Start talking to your kids early about all drugs, about pot and what it is. Explain to them that some marijuana products may look like candy bars or sweets. Tell them if they aren’t sure about a piece of candy or a sweet they found, take it to an adult first. Kids should be careful about sharing snacks and lunches.

» Preteens and teens

Try to keep the conversation going. As your kids get older, talk to them about the risks of doing marijuana and other drugs even if they don’t seem interested.

A good time to talk is on the way to a game or event when your kids are in the back seat of the car. They will feel less threatened without you sitting in front of them. Ask them about their opinions on drugs, what they know or what they have seen or heard at school, and make sure they know your opinions on drug use.

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John and Mary Rotherham, 74 and 73, aren’t exactly a couple of hippies.

Despite the fact that their son, John Rotherham Jr., owns a medical marijuana store in Garden City, the pair never even touched pot until they reached their 70s.

But when arthritis in John’s leg and back began keeping him awake at night, his son recommended edible marijuana in the form of a candy bar from his Nature’s Herbs and Wellness Center, 522 27th St. in Garden City. Doctors recommended a shot in his spine three to four times a year.

It’s probably not surprising that John chose the candy.

“He told me — because we’re not used to it, we’re from a long time ago — he said, ‘Start out real small.’ And that is what I did,” John Sr. said. “I take one square, and I go right to sleep and I don’t wake up until morning,” he said with a relieved smile.

Pot brownies have had a home in college dorm rooms for decades, but with the legalization of weed in Colorado, a flurry of new marijuana-infused edibles, from candy bars to sodas to spice cakes, have hit recreational shelves and gained popularity as an alternative way to get high.

The story is the same in Garden City, the home of four recreational marijuana facilities that serve a large swath of northern Colorado. The owners say edibles account for up to 50 percent of their recreational sales.

Frequent users such as Rotherham extol edibles for relieving pain, lasting longer and not adversely affecting the lungs. But there are problems with them, as well.

A multitude of first-time users have made the mistake of eating too much, prompting an increase in calls to poison control centers and trips to the emergency room.

Of even more concern to public health officials is kids, who with their boundless affinities for sweet treats, could get hold of edibles without knowing what they really are.

“Edibles look like doughnuts or cookies,” said Eric Aakko, spokesman for the Weld County Department of Public Health and Environment. “If a kid sees a doughnut that has recreational marijuana in it and doesn’t know, it could have a very negative, adverse effect on the child.”

Greeley was at the center of a national spotlight on edibles in April, when four fourth-grade boys at Monfort Elementary School were caught buying and selling marijuana products on the playground. The two students selling both got the products during visits to their grandparents’ homes.

The incident raised concerns that teachers may not be able to tell if students are bringing edible products to school.

John Gates, director of school safety and security at Greeley-Evans School District 6, said that incident also brought about concerns about the potency of edible products.

“What I confiscated (from the fourth-graders) is about the same amount of THC as three joints,” he said.

That gets especially dangerous if kids don’t realize they are consuming an edible marijuana product and eat until they are full.

“With a bite-sized candy bar, the worst you can get is a sugar high. We recover from sugar highs pretty quickly,” Gates said. “My concerns were realized when we found the edible marijuana (in Greeley schools). It was pretty shocking for people not just here, but nationwide.”

‘More than they bargained for’

Many things about pot and especially edibles are a mystery to health officials and doctors, who are still restricted in their studies because marijuana remains illegal under federal law.

The standard dose under state law for an edible is 10 mg of THC, which is the main psychoactive ingredient in marijuana. Recreational marijuana edibles are limited to 100 mg of THC, meaning one recreational brownie often has 10 standard doses of THC.

Eating too much — say, the whole brownie — can make a person hallucinate or vomit and trigger paranoia and anxiety, said Amy Driscoll, a pediatrician at University of Colorado Health Pediatrics in Greeley.

Ingesting marijuana takes much longer to feel and to peak than smoking it because it goes through the digestive process, she said. While pot smokers feel the effects almost immediately, it can take anywhere from 30 minutes to several hours for an edible to start working.

Tucker Eldridge, a master grower at Nature’s Herbs and Wellness, said the composition of THC changes when it passes through the liver. That means THC that is ingested reacts differently with the cannabinoid receptors in the brain, so edibles can knock even a highly tolerant, experienced smoker on his back.

Problems ensue when consumers don’t wait at least 30 minutes, if not more, for their edible to take effect and decide to eat more.

“An adult probably could handle 10 mg (of THC),” said Alvin Bronstein, medical director of the Rocky Mountain Poison Control Center, which has already seen more calls this year than all of last year regarding accidental marijuana ingestion. “Where the adults get into trouble is, they will stack the doses ... People get impatient, and they get more than they bargained for.”

In Denver, local and national media buzzed about two deaths that involved edible marijuana. In April, a woman killed by her husband told dispatchers before he shot her that her husband had eaten marijuana candy and painkillers. And in March, a 19-year-old student from Wyoming fell from a hotel balcony and died after eating pot-infused cookies.

Those have so far been the only reported deaths linked to ingesting edibles. The most dangerous aspect of marijuana consumption is the risky behavior that can come with it.

“Definitely something is going on, and people need to be very respectful of this drug, like any drug,” Bronstein said.

John Sr. said he once ate a little more of his candy bar than he normally does at night — about a square and a half.

“I woke up the next morning, and it’s like I had a fog,” he said. “I couldn’t concentrate too much, and that was just a very little bit.”

Jerry Williams, a 37-year-old customer at Cannabis Care Wellness Center, 2515 7th Ave. in Garden City, said he similarly had a bad experience eating pot brownies and cookies before, which is why he opts for edibles that come in doses of 10 mg each.

“I like them as far as the effects,” Williams said of edibles. Last week, he clutched a bag that contained sweet and sour gummy treats because they were out of his favorites, cherry bombs. “You can still keep kind of a clear head.”

Andrea Gibbons, manager of Cannabis Care, said her budtenders stress, especially to first-time consumers, to wait 45 minutes to an hour before eating more of an edible. But those pleas are sometimes ignored.

“People are like, ‘Awe, I’ve got this,’ ” she said, and they decide to eat more anyway. “That is what is giving edibles a bad name.”

Consume responsibly

In the meantime, business is booming at Nature’s Herbs and Wellness.

John Jr., a 49-year-old with a gray ponytail, stood last week in the little kitchen at Nature’s Herbs, where his sister bakes an average of 24 brownies per day to feed the burgeoning appetites of edible consumers.

“This is where we make gold,” he quipped. Nature’s Herbs right now is the only dispensary in Garden City that makes some of its own edibles, although Cannabis Care could soon build out a kitchen. The other dispensaries buy their products from Denver-area providers. Nature’s Herbs buys some of those, too.

Rotherham explained his company uses the leaves, instead of the buds, of its own marijuana plants to make the brownies by flushing them with butane to extract the THC. Then they add the concentrate to butter and bake it into a treat.

Just a few years ago, the leaves would have been useless because they have a lower concentration of THC, Rotherham said.

“I call it trash into cash,” he said.

In addition to brownies, Rotherham said his sister makes a mean spice cake. Rotherham said he goes through about 2,000 Incredibles, a brand of marijuana-infused candy bars, per week, and 100 boxes of “Chill pills” — mellow, low-dose mints — per week.

Rotherham has big plans for expansion, including a new, 10,000-square-foot facility with a basement for growing and a remodeled front — all without a single bank loan.

But he said that could change, if new state regulations make it too costly to keep doing business.

In an effort to prevent overdoses, new draft rules coming from the Colorado Department of Revenue would make it more costly for producers to make products that have more than 10 mg of THC in them, which is the standard dose.

Among the more costly proposals are requirements that would mean a 100 mg cookie or brownie, for instance, would have to be broken up and individually wrapped and labeled in 10 mg pieces.

Rotherham said he “is all for” regulation of the marijuana industry.

“We want to be nothing but compliant,” he said. “The more regulation there is, the more it legitimizes this business.”

But he said there is a breaking point for any business on what is affordable, and requiring the added expenses of packaging and labor for individually wrapped doses could be it.

Rotherham said requirements for child-proof packaging on all edibles are already expensive. For things like candy bars, they must use a child-proof bag with a zipper that locks. Customers are encouraged to bring back their bags, but purchasing enough for new and out-of-state customers is a drain on resources, Rotherham said.

And at some point, it is the responsibility of consumers to enjoy their product responsibly.

“A misconception with edibles is that it tastes so good” that consumers can’t stop eating it until they overdose, Rotherham said.

“Apple vodka tastes good, too, but you don’t drink the whole bottle.”

Gates said he believes the new regulations could help, at least a little.

“It’s a step in the right direction, but I doubt it will solve all of our issues,” he said.

Gates said he respects the legal right of adults 21 and over to purchase marijuana, but those rights come with the responsibility of keeping it away from kids.

“I am hoping parents and grandparents, that they won’t leave their marijuana unsecured anymore,” he said. “That is all I can ask.”

“Edibles look like doughnuts or cookies. If a kid sees a doughnut that has recreational marijuana in it and doesn’t know, it could have a very negative, adverse effect on the child. — Eric Aakko, spokesman for the Weld County Department of Public Health and Environment